Leading America's horses to safety since 2003.

Archive for September, 2008

First thing this morning Jason drug himself out of bed, dressed up to do a dirty job, and got the wheel fixed on the trailer. Last time it was used some mysterious grinding noises were coming from the wheels, sounding like a bearing. Fortunately it was an easy fix and it got done in less than half an hour.

Then Jason changed into town clothes to take Lallie to her new home.

Deb came out again today to work with the horses. She is sure a very useful volunteer and member of our organization! She got several horses evaluated and got some training done. Great work Deb!

Annette and Kimmy came out today as well and cleaned stalls, did all the dirty work first, and then headed in to do adoption applications. Thanks so much for your great help! We really appreciate it. It’s not always fun cleaning stalls, but it has to be done and it sure takes a load off everyone else.

Lallie enjoyed her new home, and got to meet Hershey, another horse that was adopted from us. She is so happy in her new home!

Hershy sure is looking great these days, so clean and fat and happy. Just the way we love to see horses treated. He gets his fly mask washed and dried every night. His Mommy is the most diligent person around when it comes to keeping the hay our of his water trough. Thanks for giving Hershy such a wonderful home.

Jason headed to Home Depot to get some siding for the tack room. Once he arrived back to the rescue it had to be unloaded. Once again he changed, this time back from town clothes to work clothes. He kind of felt like a teenager that couldn’t quite figure out which outfit to wear today.

He was able to get some of the siding up and it looks great!

Nook and his Mommy headed off to their new home today. Tawnee loaded them up and delivered them this afternoon.

Nooks adoptive mommy is so thrilled to have Nook home now. She will be fostering Jai, Nooks mommy, until he is weaned. She has been driving to the rescue every few days to spend time with Nook, and it is just going to work out great to have Nook and Jai moved to her place. Thank you so much for giving Nook a great home!

Pastor Larry, the guy that may be performing weddings at the rescue (if there are any takers,) came out this evening to adopt Dinky Donkey. Larry has recently lost his donkey, Red Dog, he had owned for 15 years. Red Dog was the mascot for his ranch. Dinky Donkey will take Red Dog’s place at the ranch for the next many years. The really neat thing is, Cowgirl, Dinkey Donkey’s best friend of many years, is boarded at Larry’s stable and so Dinky and Cowgirl will get to spend time together. How cool is that!

Ok, this is the first and last mention of this voting for money things unless something extra special comes along. We’ve been asked if we would be eligible for this particular one, and the answer is Yes, we are eligible, but after the Petfinder had such troubles with their voting system we are wary of any online voting system. Especially when there is so much money involved. You are welcome to vote if you would like, click here. It seems more secure, and there are anti-vote fraud measures in place, but we do not feel called to solicit votes at this time. Feel free to check it out and spread the word if you would like. We would definitely be grateful if anything was to come of this, but we are really burnt out from online voting websites.

It is so great that equines are finding their forever homes, opening up spaces for more to be rescued at the next auction.

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Quite a lot happened today. For starters, the auction fund is now at $1847. Thank you so much for your generosity in saving lives! Over halfway there, and still some time but it is ticking down. Oct 12th is the next auction day.

Long time volunteer Teressa came out today to volunteer wherever needed, and among lots of other things she did she got to rode a horse for the first time while volunteering. She loves riding English, and since Roan is an English horse she got to ride. She got to evaluate her as a dressage horse to see what she knew.

The abandoned dog we rescued along the road loved hanging out with Becky. She was trying to smooch a grooming as Becky is one of the best doggy groomers in the west. We named the doggie Hugs, it seems to fit her well. Despite her subtle clues, Hugs didn’t get a grooming today. Becky took the day off from dogs to spend time with horses instead.

The contractor came out today and wrapped up his part on the tack room. The roof got nailed down, Jason will be the one that lays the metal roofing down on top…

…the front door got installed and it’s looking really nice!

Beauty tried to steal a turkey sandwich off the picnic table, someone needs to let her know that horses are herbivores!

One of the highlights of the day: Hugs got a forever home! She couldn’t be smiling any bigger if she tried, and neither could the kids. She is going to be loved and pampered for sure. Rescuing dogs and getting them into homes might just be easier than horses. But, they’re not facing cruel slaughter either. We’re so glad we could get Hugs a home, a dog whose heartless owner dumped on the back road, hoping their problem would just go away and die, literally.

In between working ferociously hard, Tawnee spent a few minutes winding twine on the twine ball. All the extra twine laying around is now in the twine ball. It’s getting bigger and bigger. It seems the balls hairy days are over for now.

Deb came out and worked extremely hard evaluating, cleaning, training, and spending time with the horses. Thanks so much Deb! Deb is becoming an awesome matchmaker when it comes to matching a rescued horse to an open home.

Jason helped do some cleanup in between fixing fences and doing bookwork. The list of chores he got done just goes on and on…

One of the horses Deb evaluated today, Lallie, got adopted. This previous adopter got married this weekend and spent part of her honeymoon at the rescue, adopting her new baby. She introduced a novel concept: she says she should have gotten married at the rescue. That would be quite interesting to say the least, any takers? We have a pastor that has adopted from us and enjoys spending time at the rescue, so, we’re ready.

Finally the old tack rooms walls were taken down, Annette, Deb, Tawnee and Jason each grabbed a corner and moved it so it can provide shelter for some horses.

It looks great and the horses loved it. Not bad for $180 at Cosco a couple years ago. It has served its purpose in life very well, and it’s still providing shelter! It’s strange having it gone from its original place though, it has been there since ground was broke at the rescue.

After the old tack room was removed it was time to clean up where it sat. Lots of boards had to be moved that held saddles and blankets.

As the sun was setting the area was looking neat and tidy.

Ann Marie came out to spend some time with Sierra and her baby. Annette enjoyed saying goodnight to Sierra and Hocks, her baby, before she left. It’s the first time that Sierra has taken a carrot from someone other than Ann Marie.

Sierra is really doing good now that her baby is here. She seems happier, more content, and unless all our eyes are deceiving us, she’s gained a lot of weight recently Maybe it’s all in our imagination, but she sure seems a lot better now that her baby is back.

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The auction fund is now at $1597. We are almost halfway there! Thank you so much for your generosity.

We headed down to Gaiser Pets in Yuba City as they had a box of donation funds for us. We cannot thank business’ enough for setting out donation cans for us, it really adds up! Thank you Gaiser Pets! They had the most creative, cutest donation box we have ever seen, definitely an A++.

From there we headed out to get some horses from a back yard breeder. We’ve gotten a lot of horses that he takes to the Roseville Livestock Auction, mostly mustangs: bred mares, babies, etc. Sierra was the last horse that we rescued from the auction that came from his place and she was extremely emaciated. He offered to let us come buy some of his horses, for about the same price as we would pay at the auction, before he takes them to auction so we took up his offer. Come to find out, these horses are living in a junkyard! There is twisted metal, rebar sticking straight up in the air, just a horrible mess.

We were coming there to get two horses, a mare and a gelding, but then we realized that the mare had a baby of her own and had also adopted Sierra’s baby when the guy hauled Sierra off to the auction, leaving an orphan foal. Good thing this mare was wise enough to take care of the baby when the guy was not. We made an offer on the baby’s, which was denied, and after a long bickering he agreed to sell them to us at $100 each. We paid $125 for the adult horses, one of which he said was crazy (the gelding.) He got down close to Tawnee’s ear and whispered “If you weren’t buying him I would butcher him myself.” It sure made Tawnee’s blood boil!

We got the 4 horses out of the junkyard and into decent living conditions at our Gridley irrigated pasture. We unloaded three of them, but left Sierra’s baby in the trailer. We have a big surprise for Sierra!

Sierra is looking so much better than when we rescued her at the auction in July!… …she was merely a bag of bones. By the way, the back yard breeder bred her to a paint stallion in this condition. Sierra and baby are happily reunited now! The baby was so happy to see his mommy, he just kept whinnying and whinnying before we unloaded him. We are so happy to reunite mommy and baby.

Have a great weekend!

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Today was one of those office work days that has no interesting photo’s. Being stuck behind a computer is not glamorous or fun, but it is a vital part of rescuing horses. Appointments were made for potential adopters to see the horses. Two horses were placed in adoption pending today: Annie and Mariah. Lots of phone calls and emails were done too. It’s tough keeping up with all the contact that comes our way, but we do the best we can!

We worked hard on getting an E-news written up and sent out. If you didn’t get a copy, click here to read it. We hope you enjoy it!

One of the people making appointments forwarded a link to a blog called “The Jurga Report: Health Horse Headlines.” It has a great article about horse slaughter and what can be done to do away with this horrible activity. We think you will find the article quite interesting if you have a couple extra minutes, click here.

And, to keep everyone focused on why horses have to be rescued, here is a link to a news report done undercover by a Canadian news company. It’s a 20 minute documentary, so grab a box of tissues. It is well worth watching if you would like to see the reality of what happens in “civilized” Canada to our beloved horses. The borders need to be shut: yesterday!

This is a small blog, but that is what happens when office work gets caught up on. We did get the hay barn ordered, 3 – 4 weeks it should be here! We just have to get the land leveled for it.

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Today was a day at the vet. After the morning chores were done we loaded up the horses that were going to the vet. Macho was more than willing for whatever adventure laid in front of him.

We arrived at the vet and the horses were unloaded. Macho Man seemed so excited. There was so many new things to see!

Two of the horses that were taken to the vet were there for the Last Act of Kindness. One was the old foundered mare. Our vet and bare foot trimmer both recommended that due to her age and founder, along with her bad rear leg, the kindest thing to do was to relieve her suffering. The other was Rosey. We have been diligently trying to find a home for her, but potential adopters were concerned about her sever fibroticmyopaythy, and that she required an experienced rider. With the hard economic times, there are fewer and fewer qualified homes looking for pasture pets. We can all be thankful that these two wonderful horses were spared the brutality of slaughter. They fell asleep peacefully, eating grain and knowing that they were loved and cared for.

One of the other horses we took to the vet was rescued at the last auction. His name is Mariah. He is a 12 year old TB, off the track at one time. He is absolutely sweet and is very well trained to ride. Tawnee noticed something going on with his hind end, but upon examination the vet agreed that there was some weakness going on. She said most likely he just needs some good conditioning and some proper care. If she didn’t have so many horses he would already be in adoption pending.

Finally the wait was over for Macho Man. Both of his front feet are clubbed, but one is really bad. His is literally walking on his tippy toe. He is 10 years old, and he has been like this all his life. We wanted to see if there was anything we could do to make his little world a more comfortable place.

X-rays were taken…

..and the x-rays show that his tendon is severely contracted. The red line represents a tendon pulling on the coffin bone, pulling his hoof further and further down. If left untreated his hoof may continue to turn under until it buckles and he would no longer be mobile.

We were told the best solution was a surgery and corrective trimming. The surgery would be $300-$500. On the way back to the ranch Tawnee was brainstorming on fundraising ideas. We stopped by the post office to pick up the mail, and guess what was there? A little card with a note that says “Hope this helps a bit – best of luck!” and a check for $500! We immediately excitedly called the vet to schedule his surgery, she said “Man, you should have left him here!” We didn’t know the money was in the mailbox or we would have. His surgery is schedule for Oct 2nd. He will be a lot more comfortable once it is all done and he has recovered. Thank you so much Renata and Raj for your generous donation.

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We did it! All the needed funds have been raised for the hay barn, we will be ordering it tomorrow! This was a hard fundraiser to pull off, but thanks to your generosity it will be on its way. Now we need to get the tractors lined up, get the barn delivered and find some strong volunteers to help raise it on up! Thank you so very much, words cannot appreciate how awed and inspired we are by each and every ones generosity.

A sad note about Indus. Indus has been valiantly fighting strangles, and has been in quarantine ever since she contracted strangles, but she gave up the fight and had no will to live. We loaded her into our trailer on a stretcher and rushed her to the vet this morning as quickly as we could, but upon examination there was nothing that could be done, so she was humanely euthanized. She passed on extremely peacefully and is now forever free from pain and fear. We love you Indus, we are so sorry that we could not adopt you into your waiting home. Strangles is a really terrible disease, we strongly recommend talking to your vet about protecting your beloved horse from strangles. Strangles is rarely a life threatening disease but unfortunately at times it does take a precious life.

After Indus was taken to the vet this morning life got a lot happier. Patches, the 27th horse we rescued way back in August of 2004, came back today. Her adopters some time after receiving ownership, were leaving the country so they transferred ownership to another family. Due to the hard economic times they were unable to keep her, and as our doors are always open wide for horses we have adopted out, she came back today. She is a sweet 20 year old paint mare. She’s in great shape other than her nose got sunburned, someone should have put on SPF-30!

Here is a photo of Patches at the livestock auction we rescued her at in 2004. It’s the Cottonwood auction that no longer has a monthly horse sale.

The rest of the blog is dedicated to Brianna for working her tail off today! Thanks for all your hard work. Brianna came out and got to work mucking stalls.

After they were all clean, she took a break from working and harrowed the pastures making them extremely neat and clean, along with spreading the manure so the fly’s have nowhere to lay their eggs. We can’t wait, fly season is almost over!

Finally we were all able to take a break from all the work as some people wanted to visit the rescue. They flew in to Sacramento today and headed out to the rescue. In addition to visiting all the horses they got to see Dottie and Macho Man run around. Yes, Dottie and Macho Man are getting to enjoy each others company. Now they probably can’t imagine life without each other. It was a great visit and after walking around we all sat down under the shade maker to do some visiting. There were a few words exchanged about the hay barn when…

… to our utter shock, amazement and disbelief $10,000 cash was on our picnic table. Good thing we got the picnic table! Yes, to our greatest excitement, the hay barn will be ordered. This is the largest cash donation ever made to Norcal at one time, we cannot thank Anonymous donors for their generosity. The additional funds are to be used wherever needed most.

We said goodbye and got to work on the afternoon project: concreting the horse stock, making a nice solid footing for giving baths, vaccines, wormings, etc. Foreman Macho Man lived up to his name and made sure the job was being done right.

Tawnee and Brianna, along with some supervision from Jason, mixed up the concrete and poured…

… and leveled and decorated the pad. Brianna enjoyed it all, we think, and is looking forward to her next volunteer visit.

Finally just before nightfall the pad was done! It looks great and will be extremely useful.

Ann Marie came out and make good progress with Sierra. She got a rope around her for first time today and Sierra got her first leading lesson. She gives to pressure really nicely.

This was Sierra when she was first rescued August 10th. This was her auction photo. She is gaining a lot of weight and is a lot happier looking.

What a day, it was the kind of day that takes your breath away in sorrow and then gives it back with an unexpected large donation!

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A great update on Breezy: she is doing great in her adoptive home. Breezy came from the same Nv feedlot as the baby and mommy in yesterdays blog. They were rescued exactly, to the day, a year apart. The mommy and baby came in on March 22nd, 2006 and Breezy and the rest in her rescue group, came in March 22nd, 2007. Breezy is such a beautiful girl and we’re so glad we could save her from being slaughtered.

Today started off with Jason getting supplies for pouring concrete around the horse stock. It will be great to have it poured and finished, hopefully tomorrow. 12 sacks of 80 lb concrete can be tough. We should have a couple long distance volunteers to help us out.

After the concrete was unloaded, it was time for Sally to go to her new home. Sally will be joining another one of our rescued horses, Zara.

Zara and her handsome prince gelding, in the lead, are living a wonderful life. They enjoy running around their 5 acres, eating yummy food and going for trail rides every so often. Thanks for giving them such a wonderful home Chrisanne!

Josie, the little pony from the last auction rescue, and Nugget, who was adopted awhile ago, headed off to their new home today! It took awhile for Nugget’s transporting to be arranged, but it’s ok because her adopter fell in love with Josie too, so they got to make the trip together.

Ann Marie came out again today, help prepare twine for being wound onto the ball, and worked with Sierra. While she was tying twine together, Sierra kept looking over at her and whinnying “Hey, I’m down here!” Anna Marie and Sierra sure are becoming best friends!

Cathy and her girls came out to help us tackle the tack rooms. We got it all a lot more organized and stuff is being put away. A lot of the extra tack will be used for saving lives at the next rescue. Cathy is going to take the tack to her place, clean it up, and get it ready for the sale.

Cathy’s girls enjoyed playing with the twine ball. We were done with the tack room for the day, and so we all spent a bit of time playing with the ball o’ twine…

It was nice and neat, each string nice and tight, all being tied off as it went, but it was taking forever…

… but our efficiency engineer suggested a method that sped the whole operation up a wee bit, like, 870%. “Just wrap it all together and then tie a couple strings around the outside.” Now it’s just a twine ball gone wild. Guess this is the teenage rebellious stage of this balls life. It does weigh a whopping 20 lbs as of today! The next twining will have to be neater and tighter.

Overall a lot got accomplished today, 3 horses headed off to their new homes. Please spread the home that horses need homes!